# What is the first sentence from the book you are currently reading? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** books-writing-myths\ **Created:** [April 20, 2017, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858 "2017-04-20T16:51:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 52
**Author:** ![Scoville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@Scoville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scoville)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2020, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1023 "2020-03-26T16:01:39Z")
“This is the house where I say goodbye.” -”Wandering” by Herman Hesse ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2020, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1024 "2020-03-26T16:05:03Z")
“She fell like a maple seed, pirouetting on an autumn breeze.” Braiding Sweetgrass, by Robin Wall Kimmerer ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2020, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1025 "2020-03-26T16:20:05Z")
> [@Dendarii\_Dame](#): > > _The Court of Last Resort_, by Erle Stanley Gardner Classic detective novels: the elite choice for quarantine reading! “‘That’s torn it!’ said Lord Peter Wimsey.” — Dorothy L. Sayers; _The Nine Tailors_ (1934) ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2020, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1026 "2020-03-26T16:27:32Z")
“The Galactic Empire was falling.” _Foundation and Empire_ by Isaac Asimov “The First Galactic Empire had endured for tens of thousands of years.” _Second Foundation_ by Isaac Asimov “‘Every hero,’ Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, ‘becomes a bore at last.’ More than a hundred years after his birth on May 29, 1917, John Fitzgerald Kennedy confounds Emerson’s dictum and retains a hold on the popular imagination.” _JFK: A Vision for America_ ed. by Stephen Kennedy Smith and Douglas Brinkley ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2020, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1027 "2020-03-29T15:27:53Z")
> [@Ukulele\_Ike](#): > > Classic detective novels: the elite choice for quarantine reading! Actually, _The Court of Last Resort_ isn’t a novel, although parts of it read like good short stories. Erle Stanley Gardner and other men with knowledge of the law and criminology investigated cases of people who were possibly wrongly convicted of serious crimes. These are some of the cases they worked on. It’s an interesting book. My current book: “Lilly’s lamp blew out as she bolted down the hallway.” _The Rithmatist_, by Brandon Sanderson ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2020, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1028 "2020-03-30T23:43:14Z")
“I’ve learned that deciding whom you marry is the most important decision you’ll ever make.” _Live and Learn and Pass It On_, edited by H. Jackson Brown, Jr. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2020, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1029 "2020-03-31T18:38:14Z")
“Bleak and windswept is the little town of Kirkby-Malhouse, harsh and forbidding are the fells upon which it stands.” _Tales of Adventure and Medical Life_, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2020, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1030 "2020-04-02T17:02:09Z")
“When I was a child, art seemed like a tunnel to me.” _Jerome Robbins: By Himself_, edited by Amanda Vaill ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2020, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1031 "2020-04-06T15:23:13Z")
“They were all in the family room that morning when the surprising letters came.” _The Secrets of the Pirate Inn_ by Wylly Folk St. John ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2020, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1032 "2020-04-07T15:51:10Z")
“The Norway campaign seemed like a military disaster for the Alllies, but without it Britain might have been conquered in 1940.” _Operation Sea Lion: The Failed Nazi Invasion That Turned the Tide of War_, by Leo McKinstry ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2020, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1033 "2020-04-09T04:52:02Z")
“William Blakely? Oh my God, you mean Blockade Billy. Nobody’s asked me about him in years.” _Blockade Billy_ by Stephen King (2010) “Let us pray for the Kingdom of God on Earth, as for ourselves, our church, our country, our cause, and for all sorts and conditions of men in a world at war.” _Prayers for Private Devotions in War-Time_ by Rev. Willard L. Sperry (1942) ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2020, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1034 "2020-04-11T13:49:29Z")
“Once, when I was very young, Father took me in the motor-car to the Via Appia, to see a man being crucified.” _The Aquiliad_, by Somtow Sucharitkul ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2020, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1035 "2020-04-12T21:26:41Z")
“Mathematics is the subject many of us love to hate.” _Numbers: How Counting Changed the World_, by Tom Jackson ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1036 "2020-04-13T02:58:44Z")
“Each of us bears his own hell.” – _Kona Winds_, by Scott Kikkawa. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1037 "2020-04-13T20:44:41Z")
“I don’t know why I’m writing this. That’s not true. Maybe I do know and just don’t want to admit to myself.” _The Silent Patient_ by Alex Michaelides (2019) ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1038 "2020-04-13T23:23:15Z")
“I take a deep breath and look out at the sea of faces.” _Out to Lunch_ by Stacey Ballis ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2020, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1039 "2020-04-14T21:56:12Z")
"Patricia Kyle said, ‘Is this Elvis Cole, the world’s greatest detective?’ " – _Lullaby Town_, by Robert Crais. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2020, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1040 "2020-04-17T12:32:52Z")
“Time and responsibility. What a vapid subject for a vapid truism and gaseous generalities adding up to the world’s most boring sermon.” _The Clock of the Long Now: Time and Responsibility_, by Stewart Brand. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2020, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1041 "2020-04-18T19:04:20Z")
“In the late and last afternoon of an April long ago, a forlorn little group of travellers cross a remote upland in the far south-west of England.” _A Maggot_, by John Fowles ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2020, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1042 "2020-04-19T20:24:18Z")
“Jennifer Sheridan stood in the door to my office as if she were Fay Wray and I was King Kong and a bunch of black guys in sagebrush tutus were going to tie her down so that I could have my way.” – _Free Fall_, by Robert Crais [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858.md?page=51) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858.md?page=53)